Is Doughty really Labour or self-servative with an eye on a Welsh political party

Op-Ed: If it was true that all publicity is good publicity Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn would be a sure-fire success.

The reality however is that certain publicity can undermine a political party leader, even ridiculing him or her, and in so doing scupper any future election success and help the opposition to romp home at election time.

Jeremy Corbyn's cabinet reshuffle

There have been guffaws and criticism of Corbyn's front bench reshuffle this week from the right-wing media, and some within the party, but we should never forget that for them he is in a no-win situation. However he acts and whatever he does it will be spun to suit their agenda.

The general public are left with a biased and unbalanced picture and in some cases that undermines Mr Corbyn as party leader. News and political junkies will pick over reports and rip them apart to get to the heart of the matter but the general public more often than not will skim over them; they have enough to concern them in their daily lives.

As Corbyn considered changes to his cabinet the knives were quickly out. He was attacked for taking his time over the reshuffle but his attackers would have done the same if he acted with speed.

He was accused of shuffling his opposition cabinet too soon after selecting it in September but he was elected party leader September 12, 2015, and was dealt a short hand. His leadership race partners Liz Kendall and Yvette Cooper took themselves to the backbenches and refused to serve alongside Corbyn. That left many Labour supporters wondering if they really had the Labour party in their hearts or were self-serving politicians.

The reshuffle in many ways was engineered in, and by, the media with a little help from one or two other self-serving Labour politicians feeding the press; this helped cause the apparent delay.

Grown men cited reasons of supporting colleagues and political differences in what looked like an impromptu episode of Grange Hill.

The third person to resign was Stephen Doughty and he did this live on BBC TV with a little help from the Beeb's staff.

This has led to anger.

BBC News is supposed to be an independent news channel not working for the government. It denies collusion and tries to explain away its actions as 'journalistic' but official complaints have been made.

The BBC in a way is acting suicidal as the Tory government wants to privatise it and will now have another reason to do so.

But if you are a Labour supporter surely the bulk of your anger is directed at Stephen Doughty who has shown as much allegiance to the Labour Party as David Cameron would. Another quitter, Jonathon Reynolds, made sure his resignation letter to Jeremy Corbyn was published in another Tory rag, the Telegraph.

There was lot of good work by Labour and Mr Corbyn this week but it was overshadowed by negative press regarding the opposition Cabinet reshuffle.

The Commons' vote on Syria

The mainstream media and the Tories are trying to run the show and in effect spitting on British democracy.

The Commons' debate on Syria was held on the day before a by election in Oldham West and Royton. A full day’s debate kept the House busy but if the Tories thought it would result in an election defeat for Mr Corbyn and Labour they were wrong.

But what was the rush for the debate and vote?

The UK was quick to launch a couple of attacks in Syria, post-debate and vote, which were televised on Sky News and the BBC, but then nothing.

Was the timing more about the Oldham election?

The problem with playing dirty

For the Tories the problem is their record of playing dirty.

Dirty tricks dogged the 2015 General Election and brought home Tory election victory.

Mr Corbyn faces an uphill struggle to keep support in the run up to the next election scheduled for 2020 with so many enemies eager to attack.

He and the Labour Party do not need dirty tricks from within.

If Corbyn's enemies within managed to oust him as leader the party would lose many supporters including this writer who did not vote for him but respects the fact he was democratically elected.

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